Winnipeg women recovers sight in eye badly damaged in random attack
The federal privacy commissioner says Canadians need better tools to protect their online reputation, including the right to ask search engines to de-index or remove inaccurate, incomplete or outdated information.
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner says its proposals have some similarities to the Right to Be Forgotten rules in Europe but that existing Canadian law already contains protections for online reputation.
For instance, a federal privacy law covering the private sector currently provides for both de-indexing — which removes links but leaves content on a database — and the removal of content from the internet through source takedown.
The report says Canadians Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien holds a news conference at the National Press Theatre in Ottawa last year to discuss his annual report.
should be permitted to easily delete information they’ve posted about themselves on social media and have the right to challenge information that’s illegal,
inaccurate, incomplete or out-of-date.
Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien is also recommending that Parliament undertake
a study of the issue, so that elected officials confirm that Canada has the right balance between privacy and freedom of information.
A Winnipeg woman who lost her sight in one eye last June from a vicious random attack can now see almost perfectly after multiple surgeries.
Brittney Thomas-Ljungberg, 29, was all smiles Friday as she described the joy of being able to see out of her right eye that was split open by a sucker punch from a stranger as she was walking with her boyfriend.
“I can see,” she said. “Which is 100 times better than what was the original diagnosis of like, ‘Hey you’re going in for surgery you might not have your eye when you come back out.”’
She suffered a global rupture, a torn retina and damage to the eye lens.
Dr. Frank Stockl, a surgical retinal specialist, said when he first saw the university student, her vision was poor.
“There was so much blood in her eye I couldn’t even examine her properly,” he said.
In October, she received a lens implant and now her vision is stable with 20/25 vision.
Thomas-Ljungberg said her life has returned back to normal and you can barely notice the injury.
She said she was never really emotional about the prospect of losing her vision and stayed calm and positive for the most part.
“I am a fairly reasonable person, so I just took it as it came,” she said. “I don’t really have any tips and tricks. You just have to play the cards you’re dealt.”
The journey to regaining her vision meant not working and putting school on hold, but now she’s back at both.
“It feels like deja vu right now. I feel like I am redoing all my courses that I’ve kind of had to put on hold for speed bumps in life.”